This is just the crisis to make themselves seem relevant again within the GOP—even if they’re undermining the commander in chief at a pivotal moment.
— Why Neocons Love the StrongmanMichael Tomasky, The Daily Beast

It’s likely, then, that the J-20 no more represents the end of US air superiority than did Cope India or the T-50’s debut. What it does represent is the world’s second economy finally joining a club of nations long-accustomed to designing, building and operating advanced fighter aircraft.
— China’s Over-Hyped Stealth Jet, David Axe, The Diplomat.

Meanwhile, it remains to be seen how much the J-20’s design changes matter and indeed how effective an aircraft it is. But it is evident that the plane’s flight testing, at least, is far more than just a publicity stunt.
—Stealth Changes for China’s Stealth FighterGERRY DOYLE, NEW YORK TIMES. Gobssmacks David Axe.

It must hurt when reality overtakes liberal fantasy.

For decades the left’s orthodoxy was that the West was to make peace with Russia/The USSR, China and that “the tide of war was receding”.

Russia is INVADING the Ukraine. They used TBM’s on Georgia. China is building a modern networked force.

And yet, Michael Tomasky makes current events be all about the left and how those meanie Neo-cons runied everything.

Lest we forget, the media and the left (I repeat myself) went easy on Putin, Hugo Chavez and China. David Axe seems to think that the US military sucks and we have nothing to fear.

So when real life starts to hurt them, they either face reality (and start crying) or escape to fantasy.

“This isn’t 1940. Moreover, as an instrument of coercion, that smaller army would be more lethal than the much larger one that helped defeat Nazi Germany and imperial Japan. Given a choice between a few hundred of today’s Abrams tanks and a few thousand vintage Shermans, Gen. George Patton would not hesitate to choose the former.”
—
Do we really need a large Army?By Andrew J. Bacevich, Washington Post.

This is the same paper that whitewashes the drone strikes. George Bush would never have been given an article titled “5 myths of the Iraq war”.

And yet the “argument” for cutting the military persists.This Ain’t Hell skewers Tom Rick’s argument for “going to a cadre-like military, with only two Army divisions kept at high readiness”.

The left believes that troops are stupid. Just draft the bodies you need, buy the tanks, trucks and planes and then send them off to war. Lefties won’t go of course, the draft dogers of the 60’s became to leaders of today.

No they want to cut to the bone and keep cutting. there is talk of a new round of BRAC. Closing MORE bases, gutting civilian towns, eroding the defense industrial base. All for more spending on “domestic programs”.

Once the troops leave, their expertise is gone forever. You can’t draft leadership, tribal knowledge or hours in the cockpit.

“In the meantime, the world, from East Asia to the Middle East, is “unsettled” and becoming ever more so. Does anyone doubt that the decision in Washington to slash its defenses has been fully noted in Moscow, Beijing, Pyongyang, Tehran, and North Waziristan? Like Jeremiah, we say judgment is inevitable. Unless the present course is reversed, the wages of weakness will be paid in increased instability, crises, and ultimately conflicts that might well have been avoided.”
—
“Deeply Unsettling“, Gary Schmitt and Thomas Donnelly, WeeklyStandard.com

Every year we have some leftie intellectual murder electrons to say that “technology is ruining our lives!!11!!1!”

He dares to say the MLK couldn’t get his message out? How stupid does he think his readers are? If Youtube and Twitter were around back then, Bull Conor, George Wallace and the rest would’ve folded. TV was the the “info superhighway” of the 60′s. It made MLK a household name and buried the Jim Crow era.

We went from pony express to the telephone and telegraph, then to radio. Soon television and then the internet. From wooden airplanes to laning on the moon 60 years after the Wright Brothers first flight.

“Will 2014 bring another Great War? My bet is almost certainly not, but with a note of caution. Claims that war is “inconceivable” are not statements about what is possible in the world, but rather, about what our limited minds can conceive. The fact that Presidents Obama and Xi understand that war would be folly for both China and the US is relevant but not dispositive. None of the leaders in Europe of 1914 would have chosen the war they got and that in the end they all lost. By 1918, the Kaiser was gone, the Austro-Hungarian Empire dissolved, the Tsar overthrown by the Bolsheviks, France bled for a generation, and England shorn of the flower of its youth and treasure. Given a chance for a do-over, none of the leaders would have made the choices he did.”
— 2014: Good Year for a Great War?, Graham Allison, The National Interest.

As this decade seems to mirror the last century I’m not surprised that someone is making a comparison to the “guns of August”. I am miffed that it took’em long enough.

With the fall of Saddam and the death of Bin Laden, too many think that we’re “at peace”. Americans want out of Afghanistan. The left drools over “Obamacare” and more domestic spending.

Meanwhile the world is slowly burning, Asia is full of disputes over territory. The Middle East is in revolution and Europe is broke.

August 1916 or Spring 1938? Either way the next few years could bring a nasty surprise.

For the most adamant, personnel costs are about to eat the entire Department of Defense budget, reducing it to just a welfare agency and leaving the United States at the mercy of its enemies. Since the creation of the All-Volunteer Force, spending per servicemember has risen inexorably. The Department—as with the rest of the country—has watched its healthcare costs dramatically outpace inflation. Since the defense budget started expanding in the late 1990s, Congress has consistently heaped largesse on defense personnel. It repealed the retirement reform passed in the 1980s just before it kicked in, let former military members double dip by taking their military retirement pay while drawing a full civil service salary, allowed retirees to keep both their retirement and disabled pay, created the $10 billion-a-year TRICARE for Life Medicare supplement, and expanded eligibility for both healthcare and retirement benefits.
—Budget Deal Proves That Congress CAN Take On Military Pay & Benefits Costs , Russell Rumbaugh, BreakingDefense.com

If anything it’s a ploy to keep the big projects going. SO the recent budget deal screwed vets 62 and younger. Their COLA (cost of living adjustment) is slightly below inflation. Ouch. Pensions are fixed and for some who can’t work it’s their only income. Oh it is supposed to save $1 billion a year but future budget numbers are always 1 part projection and 2 parts fantasy.

This Rumbaugh clown thinks that pay and benefits are some luxury to be “cut”. No there is no personnel vs. readiness battle. During the 90’s the problem was cuts across the board. Now we have things like ARMY FAMILY COVENANT:

The pledge states simply: You are changing your life for the Army, so it seems that a bond should be formed that lets you know this is not a commitment taken lightly. The Army will look out for you, your soldier and your entire family. For we are all one family in the Army and should act accordingly.
— via GoArmy.com

So what does Rumbaugh use to illustrate this?

A picture of a pet in a vet clinic.

There isn’t a middle finger big enough.

You have spat upon every child, spouse and retiree who’s had to go under the knife, see a doctor, pay for food and balance a budget. Pet care is an OUT OF POCKET EXPENSE YOU DIPSTICK!!!

Ahem. Child care isn’t free either, service members pay on a scale based on rank and/or income.

Health care, pay and the tax free food and clothing sales keep service members in uniform. You should know that Rumbaugh, you were in the Army in the 90’s when people were on food stamps due to low pay. I noticed several references to the “All Volunteer Force” like it’s a bad thing. I’m starting to suspect that this is another stealth call to bring back the draft because a drugged out, unprofessional military is cheaper somehow…

According to MOAA calculations, a service member who retires as an E-7 would see an average loss of more than $3,700 a year in retired pay by the time he or she reached age 63, while an O-5 stands to lose more than $6,200 a year.

“A 20 percent reduction in retired pay and survivor benefit values is a very substantial cut in military career benefits, and does not represent good faith to our men and women in uniform,” MOAA president and retired Vice Adm. Norb Ryan said.

Notice:

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You Mileage may vary, dates in calender are closer than they appear.